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Personal data at risk, study found

Some doctors’ offices and car dealers in the Greater Toronto Area got a failing grade after private investigators found easily accessible personal records in their dumpsters.

The data could be used to steal someone’s identity exposing them to potential credit card, mortgage and health care fraud, an association of secure document disposal companies warned Thursday.

Most organizations, especially large banks and hospitals, are doing a good job of disposing of sensitive data properly, the study for the National Association of Information Destruction – Canada found.

Many dumpsters were kept under lock and key or contained only shredded documents or documents that contained no personal information, according to the study.

“Things are a lot better, but they also need to be a lot better,” said Bob Johnson, executive vice-president of the association. “Any information being found in this day and age is inexcusable.”

Most of the problems occur in smaller organizations, he said. Particularly troubling was the number of doctors’ offices and car dealerships that are throwing out sensitive information, the association said.

“Medical identity theft is a real and growing problem,” Johnson said

Investigators found 3 out of four doctors’ offices investigated had put personal data in their dumpsters, including people’s names, dates of birth, addresses, phone numbers, health card numbers, medical test results and prescriptions.

“It wouldn’t take a lot of imagination to say you’re talking about tens of thousands of doctors office across Canada are casually discarding medical information,” Johnson said.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario said doctors are required by law to safely dispose of personal records.

“We recommend all physicians shred all paper records and electronic records must be permanently deleted from all hard drives,” said Kathryn Clarke, a spokesperson for the college.

She acknowledged the college “occasionally” receives reports of personal medical records being improperly disposed of.

“Say the physician hasn’t shredded the information and it gets disposed of in a bag that is then blown down the street. That’s typically how we hear about that sort of thing,” Clarke said.

The college contacts the physician and advises them how to rectify the situation, she said.

At one of three extended health care facilities investigated, the dumpster contained personal information on “hundreds” of residents, the study found.

He gave the example of someone allergic to penicillin who goes in for emergency treatment after his records have been altered to remove any reference to the potentially life-threatening allergy.

Both of the car dealership dumpsters investigated contained “numerous” client files in unsecured garbage bins, the study found. The data included names, dates of birth and drivers’ license information.

Thieves can use car dealership data to change your vehicle registration, obtain a new key and steal your car, the association said.

Illegal immigrants are stealing people’s ID to get jobs, the association said.

The association acknowledged its sample size was relatively small but it believes it is representative.

“We may have found the only three doctors offices in Canada that are casually disposing of information, but I doubt it,” Johnson said.

The association said Canada has good laws that require personal information to be destroyed before being discarded, but enforcement is lacking.

Consumers can help protect themselves by asking how their personal information will be disposed of.

The association said it decided to hire investigators to actually inspect dumpsters, rather than simply ask companies how they dispose of their documents because companies tend to overstate their practices.

It said it broke no laws in doing so.

The association represents companies that provide secure document disposal services, an estimated $3.5 billion a year industry in North America.

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